Back to the Bridge?

I was planning to go to Stamford Bridge tomorrow.

Chelsea Women are playing Barcelona in the semi-final (second leg) of the Women’s Champions League and I have a ticket, but I'm in two minds now.

I'll come back to that later. But first let me explain why I want to go to the match.

In recent years the competition has become the holy grail for Chelsea, and the Spanish club are the team’s nemesis.

In 2021, having reached the final for the first and only time in their history, Chelsea were beaten 4-0 by Barcelona. Since then they have lost to Barcelona in two successive semi-finals.

Last year was particularly disappointing because Chelsea won the first leg, in Spain, 1-0.

After that match long-serving manager Emma Hayes, who left the club at the end of the season to start a new job coaching the US women's national team, appealed to supporters to get behind her team in the second leg, and 39,000 (including me) duly responded.

To put this in perspective, the average attendance for Chelsea Women at Kingsmeadow in Kingston-upon-Thames, where they normally play, is around 4,000.

There was a great atmosphere but it was clear fairly early in the match that Barcelona were the better team, and Chelsea lost 2-0 (2-1 on aggregate).

No complaints from me, although had they taken one or two good chances (and not had a player sent off) it might have been different.

Hayes’ replacement, Sonia Bompastor, was formerly the head coach of Lyon, the other powerhouse of women’s football in Europe.

(Lyon have won the Women’s Champions League eight times, most recently in 2022. Barcelona have been in five of the last six Champions League finals, winning three times.)

It’s not easy to follow an extremely successful coach like Hayes, who was at Chelsea for twelve years and won multiple domestic cups and titles, but Bompastor has done an impressive job.

Top of the Women's Super League (WSL) by six points and still unbeaten in the league with three matches to go, Chelsea won the Women’s League Cup in March, and are in the final of the Women’s FA Cup at Wembley on May 18.

Last season, in comparison, Emma Hayes' team won the league on goal difference, lost the Women’s League Cup final, and were defeated at the semi-final stage of the Women’s FA Cup.

However, having won the Women’s Champions League as a player and a coach with Lyon, Bompastor’s time at Chelsea will be judged - however unfairly - on the club’s European record.

The bad news is that, last Sunday, Chelsea were beaten 4-1 by Barcelona in the first leg of the semi-final, making tomorrow’s return leg something of a formality for their opponents.

Barcelona are not only the holders of the competition, having won it in 2023 and 2024, in the quarter-final this year they beat Wolfsburg, one of the two best teams in Germany, 10-2 on aggregate.

If Chelsea go for broke tomorrow (as they have to) it will leave them vulnerable to swift counter-attacks and we could end up with a similar aggregate score.

Despite that I really want to go to the match because I have always believed that if you support a team you must support them whatever the circumstances.

Also, as I have hinted before, I have surprised myself by becoming extremely invested in the women’s team and I can name almost every player in the current first team squad, plus several who are out on loan!

Contrast that with the men’s team which I have supported for almost 60 years. Sadly there is more chance of me naming the side that lost the 1967 FA Cup final to Spurs than identifying most of the players in the current squad.

This is the result of a crazy transfer policy that has turned the squad upside down, inside out, with players forever coming and going, so it’s difficult if not impossible to develop much interest in players who may leave the club months after arriving.

Take one example – João Félix, who arrived at Chelsea in January 2023 on loan from Atletico Madrid.

After returning to his parent club at the end of the season, he was then loaned to Barcelona for the 2023/24 season before Chelsea came back in the summer of 2024 and signed him on a permanent seven-year contract for a reported fee of £42 million.

Six months later he was sent on loan to AC Milan and there is currently talk of him being sold to Benfica, his original club, in the summer. What's that all about?

In recent years many more Chelsea players have been thrown into a metaphorical tumble dryer, and it’s hard if not impossible to predict who will be playing from one week to the next, let alone the following season.

So, yes, I do want to go to Stamford Bridge tomorrow, but I will be watching the women’s team because, unlike the here today gone tomorrow men’s team, I will know every player on the pitch and the bench.

Who knows, Chelsea Women might overturn a three-goal deficit against the current European champions and arguably the greatest women’s team ever.

Unlikely, but if it happens it will be one of the greatest ever comebacks in women’s football and I’d like to be there to see it.

So why am I in two minds? Well, Transport for London has emailed to say:

From 03:00 until 23:00 on Sunday 27 April, there will be extensive road closures in place across central London for the London Marathon.

Large crowds are expected along the route of the event, and Tube stations along the route will be busier than normal.

Plan ahead, allow extra time for your journey and check before you travel.

Also, I had forgotten that 70-80,000 people will be travelling to London for the FA Cup semi-final between Nottingham Forest and Manchester City at Wembley.

In other words, central London is going to be extremely busy all day, and getting to and from Stamford Bridge will be a pain at best.

I will probably have to leave home before 10.00 (kick off is 2.00pm) and I can’t see myself getting home before eight, probably later, irrespective of whether I go by road or rail. (Parking will be a nightmare, the Underground will be heaving, with long queues at Fulham Broadway after the match.)

I could of course watch the two Champions League semi-finals back-to-back on TV from the comfort of my armchair (Arsenal Women are playing Lyon in the other match) but, as anyone who enjoys live sport will tell you, it’s not the same.

Heart says go to the match, head says stay at home. Tough decision!

See also: Once more unto the Bridge (March 2025), and Bridge of sighs (April 2024)

Update: I’m feeling bad about it but I eventually chose to stay at home and watch the match on TV (TNT).

I just couldn’t face the crowds - not at the match but on the trains and Underground - knowing it would take hours to get home after the match.

I do however have tickets for Chelsea’s final WSL match of the season (against Liverpool Women) on May 10, also at Stamford Bridge, so I promise not to be such a wimp next time.

Half-time: Chelsea 0-3 Barcelona (aggregate 1-7)
Full-time: Chelsea 1-4 Barcelona (aggregate 2-8)

Bit of a drubbing but not entirely unexpected (see above).

Conversely, happy for Arsenal Women who beat Lyon 4-1 away, overturning a 2-1 deficit from the first leg.

Arsenal will now play Barcelona in the final in Lisbon.